Icons: Tutorial
Here's tutorial #4 as someone had requested! :) Made with Adobe Photoshop CS2; Uses color layers/hue&saturation/selective coloring/curves/brightness&contrast.
beforeafter
We'll start with this base:
1. Duplicate the base and set it to screen 15%. You can change the opacity to a higher percentage depending how bright you want your icon to be.
2. Go to layer -> new adjustment layer -> hue/saturation and set it to saturation: -24.
3. Create a new layer and fill it with #ffff40, and set it to soft light 85%.
4. Go to layer -> new adjusment layer -> selective coloring
reds: -100, 40, 100, 0
yellows: -30, 38, -26, 17
neutrals: 100, 15, 12, 0
blacks: 0, 0, 0, 100
5. Another selective coloring.
reds: -70, 30, 35, 0
yellows: -21, 0, 0, 0
neutrals: 42, -20, -20, 0
blacks: 0, 0, 0, 14
6. And another selective coloring.
reds: -25, 22, 24, 0
yellows: -50, 0, 0, 0
7. Go to layer -> new adjusment layer -> curves
RGB: 132, 124
Red: 123, 128
Green: 131, 123
Blue: 118, 140
8. Duplicated the curves layer and set it to 20%.
9. (Optional)
Go to layer -> new adjusment layer -> brightness/contrast
brightness: -13
contrast: 0
10. Selective coloring.
yellows: -30, 0, 20, 0
greens: 100, -55, 100, 100
cyan: 100, 0, -18, -56
magentas: 100, 0, 0, 0
whites: -50, 0, -8, 0
neutrals: 12, 7, 8, -3
11. (Optional)
And again, selective coloring.
neutrals: 12, 0, -12, 0
blacks: 0, 0, 0, 4
And you're done! :D
Do not follow this exactly. You can always change the opacity for the color layers and a few settings for the selective colorings, hue/saturation and brightness/contrast. This tutorial works best with striking colors like bright red/yellow/green/blue. Hope it helps. :D
Other icons made with this technique:
Download the .psd file here.